Integrative transcending : mysticism beyond contact and experience

Abstract

This study explores an interpretation of mysticism as a way of life that is a response to what the mystic conceives of as ultimate reality. The suggestion is that what lies at the centre of reality is the sense of a dynamic non-dialectic absence/presence. Mysticism is suggested to be an exploration of this centre of reality that takes the form of a conjoined movement of transcending and integrating. The argument of the study is developed in light of the contemporary approach that has made mysticism either totally grounded in the mystic's socio-linguistic context (Steven T. Katz) or detached from it in a 'pure consciousness event' (Robert K. C. Forman et al), both of which are primarily driven by a focus on mysticism as an experience. What is judged to have been overlooked in the contemporary discussion is that which is argued as being most endemic to mysticism, that is, the explorative life-enactment of that which the mystic conceives of as ultimate reality.